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Hot Air Balloon

Traditional news stories usually cover a single subject or the straightforward relationship between two subjects. However, every once in awhile, a story comes along that crams a deceptive number of subjects and interesting relationships into a tiny space. Exploring stories like that can be an adventure. Here’s a wonderful, five minute clip from Seeker that’s like that.

One of my favorite parts of the clip was the analogy about the rainforest as a system.

In an airplane, there are a lot of redundant screws. Maybe you don’t need every single one to fly the plane, but at some point, if they keep dropping off of the machine, it’s not going to work anymore.

Nicely said. So now, let’s unpack the story.

The most obvious thing to do is find out more about the main character in the story, Dr. Meg Lowman. It turns out that she is widely known as “Canopy Meg,” she also bills herself as an “Arbornaut,” and she’s been involved in some “interesting” research.

Here’s a clip from National Geographic that shows more about how she was involved with some researchers who explored the canopy using hot air balloons and, incredibly, a luge. Yes, a sled, and even more oddly, they also used a raft! It’s hard to imagine — you’ve got to see it!

I couldn’t help but wonder if Canopy Meg’s experiences in the Amazon served as the basis for that 1992 movie with Sean Connery and Lorraine Bracco entitled Medicine Man (IMDb) (Wikipedia). If you’ve never seen it, then here’s a trailer about the scientific side of the plot.